The Death of Idaho's Lady Bluebeard

On this date in 1958, a woman in Salt Lake City, Utah suffered a heart attack and died. Her body was brought back to her home state of Idaho and buried in the Sunset Memorial Park in Twin Falls under the name of "Anna E. Shaw." On the surface, this was a fairly normal story. However, this woman was far from ordinary.

She was better known as Lyda Southard, who was convicted of murdering her husband Edward Meyer and sentenced to 20 years in the Idaho State Penitentiary in Boise (see Old Idaho Penitentiary). Of course, that was the murder she was convicted of. The authorities were convinced that she was responsible for five more, including the death of her daughter and a brother-in-law. Like Meyer, the other three bodies were those of Lyda's three husbands. The motive was plain and simple - insurance money. The method - Boiling flypaper and extracting the arsenic, which she then fed to them in their meals (known colorfully today as Lyda Southard's Famous Apple Pie).

Lyda Southard married a total of seven times. What happened to the other husbands? Well, none of them attended her funeral.

Read more about Lyda and Sunset Memorial Park on Dark Destinations.

-Casey H.